CLF-C02 Billing, Pricing, and Support Practice Question
A company runs a combination of Amazon EC2 instances and AWS Lambda functions for its applications. The finance team wants to reduce costs by making a commitment to a consistent amount of compute usage (measured in dollars per hour) for a 1-year term. The team wants the flexibility to change instance families, sizes, and AWS regions, and also wants the commitment to cover both EC2 and Lambda usage. Which AWS pricing option should the team purchase?
⚠ Common exam trap
Many candidates confuse Compute Savings Plans with EC2 Instance Savings Plans, mistakenly thinking the latter offers the same flexibility, but EC2 Instance Savings Plans are restricted to a single instance family and do not cover Lambda or Fargate.
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
Compute Savings Plans
Compute Savings Plans provide the required flexibility to change instance families, sizes, and AWS regions, and they automatically apply to both EC2 and Lambda usage. This plan offers a discounted hourly rate in exchange for a 1-year commitment to a consistent amount of compute spend (measured in dollars per hour), making it the only option that meets all the stated requirements.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
Compute Savings Plans
Why this is correct
Compute Savings Plans offer the broadest flexibility among AWS savings plans, applying automatically to EC2, Lambda, and Fargate usage across any instance family, region, or operating system. This makes them the ideal choice for a team running a heterogeneous mix of EC2 instances and serverless workloads, as the same hourly commitment covers all compute usage. By committing to a consistent dollar amount per hour (typically 1 or 3 years), the team achieves significant discounts without being locked to a specific instance type or size.
- ✗
EC2 Instance Savings Plans
Why it's wrong here
EC2 Instance Savings Plans provide a lower discount than Compute Savings Plans but are restricted to a specific instance family within a region. They do not cover Lambda usage, so this does not meet the team's needs.
When this WOULD be correct
A company runs only EC2 instances and wants to commit to a consistent amount of compute (e.g., $10/hour) for 1 or 3 years, with flexibility to change instance size within the same family (e.g., c5.large to c5.xlarge) and operating system, but does not need to cover Lambda or change instance families or regions.
- ✗
Reserved Instances
Why it's wrong here
Reserved Instances, whether Standard or Convertible, are tied to a specific instance type, region, and tenancy at purchase time. This means a reservation for an m5.large in us-east-1 does not cover a c5.xlarge in another region or any Lambda execution, sharply limiting its usefulness for a mixed workload. While Convertible Reserves offer some exchange capability, they still require manual reconfiguration and do not extend to serverless services, so they fail to meet the team's requirement for cross-region and cross-service flexibility.
When this WOULD be correct
A company needs to run a steady-state workload on specific EC2 instance types in a single region for a 1- or 3-year term, and does not use Lambda or need flexibility. Reserved Instances would provide the highest discount for that fixed configuration.
- ✗
Spot Instances
Why it's wrong here
Spot Instances are a capacity-based purchasing model rather than a savings commitment, offering discounts based on spare EC2 capacity that AWS can reclaim with a two-minute interruption notice. They do not guarantee a consistent hourly rate across a baseline of use, because pricing fluctuates with supply and demand and the instance can be terminated at any time. Since the team needs predictable long-term cost savings for a steady workload, Spot Instances are unsuitable as the primary mechanism and cannot replace a committed-use savings plan.
When this WOULD be correct
A company runs a fault-tolerant, stateless application that can handle interruptions, and wants to achieve the highest possible discount for EC2 compute without any upfront commitment or guarantee of availability.
Option-by-option analysis
Why each answer is right or wrong
Understanding why wrong answers are wrong — and when they would be correct — is what separates a 750 score from a 900. The CLF-C02 exam frequently reuses these exact scenarios with slightly different constraints.
✓Compute Savings PlansCorrect answer▾
Why this is correct
Compute Savings Plans offer the broadest flexibility among AWS savings plans, applying automatically to EC2, Lambda, and Fargate usage across any instance family, region, or operating system. This makes them the ideal choice for a team running a heterogeneous mix of EC2 instances and serverless workloads, as the same hourly commitment covers all compute usage. By committing to a consistent dollar amount per hour (typically 1 or 3 years), the team achieves significant discounts without being locked to a specific instance type or size.
✗EC2 Instance Savings PlansWrong answer — click to see why▾
Why this is wrong here
EC2 Instance Savings Plans apply only to EC2 instance usage, not to Lambda functions, and they require commitment to a specific instance family in a region, lacking the flexibility to change instance families, sizes, or regions.
★ When this WOULD be the correct answer
A company runs only EC2 instances and wants to commit to a consistent amount of compute (e.g., $10/hour) for 1 or 3 years, with flexibility to change instance size within the same family (e.g., c5.large to c5.xlarge) and operating system, but does not need to cover Lambda or change instance families or regions.
Why candidates choose this
Candidates may confuse EC2 Instance Savings Plans with Compute Savings Plans, thinking both offer flexibility, but they overlook that EC2 Instance Savings Plans are restricted to a specific instance family and do not cover Lambda.
✗Reserved InstancesWrong answer — click to see why▾
Why this is wrong here
Reserved Instances require a commitment to a specific instance family and region, and they do not cover Lambda usage. The question demands flexibility across instance families, sizes, regions, and coverage of both EC2 and Lambda.
★ When this WOULD be the correct answer
A company needs to run a steady-state workload on specific EC2 instance types in a single region for a 1- or 3-year term, and does not use Lambda or need flexibility. Reserved Instances would provide the highest discount for that fixed configuration.
Why candidates choose this
Candidates may confuse Reserved Instances with Savings Plans, as both involve upfront commitments for discounts, but fail to recognize that Reserved Instances lack the flexibility to change instance families or regions and do not cover Lambda.
✗Spot InstancesWrong answer — click to see why▾
Why this is wrong here
Spot Instances are not a pricing commitment option; they are spare compute capacity offered at variable discounts with potential interruptions, and they cannot cover Lambda usage or provide a consistent dollar-per-hour commitment.
★ When this WOULD be the correct answer
A company runs a fault-tolerant, stateless application that can handle interruptions, and wants to achieve the highest possible discount for EC2 compute without any upfront commitment or guarantee of availability.
Why candidates choose this
Candidates may think Spot Instances are a cost-saving commitment because they offer significant discounts, but they confuse interruptible capacity with a savings plan that guarantees a consistent discount rate.
Analysis generated from the official CLF-C02blueprint and verified against question context. The “when correct” sections are what AI assistants cite when candidates ask “what’s the difference between these options?”
Quick reference
Cloud Service Model Comparison
| Model | You Manage | Provider Manages | Examples |
|---|---|---|---|
| IaaS | OS, runtime, apps, data | Hardware, hypervisor, networking | EC2, Azure VMs, GCP Compute Engine |
| PaaS | Apps and data | OS, runtime, middleware, hardware | Elastic Beanstalk, Azure App Service |
| SaaS | Data and settings only | Everything else | Microsoft 365, Salesforce, Workday |
| FaaS / Serverless | Function code only | Infra, scaling, runtime | Lambda, Azure Functions, Cloud Run |
| CaaS | Containers and apps | Kubernetes, OS, hardware | EKS, AKS, GKE |
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Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This CLF-C02 practice question is part of Courseiva's free Amazon Web Services certification practice question bank. Courseiva provides original exam-style practice questions with explanations, topic-based practice, mock exams, readiness tracking, and study analytics to help learners prepare for the CLF-C02 exam.